


Visiting Hours for the Prince

by shinymailbox



Series: something new [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Canon-Compliant, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Mental Illness, Implied/Referenced Self Harm, Mild Angst, Pre-Canon, Recovery, and it makes you vaguely emotional, the best way I can describe this particular brand of angst is, you know what’s coming for these characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-10-24 09:27:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20703707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinymailbox/pseuds/shinymailbox
Summary: The nation is in pieces. Sylvain decides it’s his duty, as the one who’s mostly whole, to take a little time to visit the bedridden crown prince.





	Visiting Hours for the Prince

**Author's Note:**

> Mmm. I had this idea a while ago and I finally put it into writing. As always, not beta read, one sitting, yada yada. Also, I’m starting to think I’m this fandom’s supplier of pre-canon gen.

He’s always had a soft spot for the prince, he realizes. 

Felix is (was) annoying, the brand of annoying that younger brothers always seemed to bring. Ingrid is (was) too serious, too goal-oriented, too uptight and unwilling to let Sylvain have fun. And Dimitri— he’s something else entirely. The young prince looks like a little girl lost at the market most of the time, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to call him kind of a doormat. He’s a goody two-shoes, but not in the way Ingrid was; he’s emotionally sensitive, but not like Felix. Dimitri never looked down on Sylvain for his antics like Ingrid would, never idolized him and trailed him like a baby duck in lieu of Felix. And while he’d been scolded a few times by the crown prince for being loud and generally reckless, Dimitri never seemed to lose a genuine sense of respect for Sylvain as a person.

He doesn’t know how he would carry on if that boy— that baby-faced, unnaturally strong, sarcasm-blind, humorless, overly apologetic, sweet boy— had burned in the fires almost three weeks ago as well. 

When Sylvain had heard the news of the massacre, it was as if the entire world crumbled around him. The nation was catapulted straight into intense mourning in the blink of an eye. Commoners mourned the king, the queen consort, the nameless soldiers who had died, the Prince’s innocence, the nation’s stability. Ingrid shut herself up in her room after the news was brought to her, according to Count Galatea. (Sylvain had sent her flowers every day last week, and two days ago he had learned that she had turned away every single one of his bouquets.) Felix, once bright-eyed and curious, had seemed angered at everything now, only bothering to go outside to swing a sword or shoot a bow. 

And Sylvain, Sylvain was caught in the middle of it all. The Tragedy still didn’t feel real to him, still made all his days uneasy and loomed over him and his friends like an angry stormcloud. But he hadn’t lost a family member to the flames that day. It wasn’t like he was particularly close to Glenn, either, even though he felt a tightness in his chest every time he thought of Felix’s doomed brother now. The Tragedy had utterly broken his friends, shattering them to their very cores, and yet Sylvain still felt like Sylvain.

————

“His Highness is staying in his room for the time being,” confirms a red-haired man Sylvain is pretty sure is Gilbert, the knight that Dimitri often talked to him about. “I have informed him beforehand that you intended to visit,” Gilbert tells him, his face stone.

“Thanks,” Sylvain says in return, because that’s the only thing he can think of at the time. He doesn’t speak, doesn’t make a peep as Gilbert leads him through the vast hallways of the familiar yet empty-feeling palace. Dimitri’s room is just where Sylvain remembers. Its white doors are a welcoming sight.

Gilbert raises his hand to knock, and the resulting sound is surprisingly soft coming from the fist of a man who Sylvain is pretty sure could bench-press him. There is the sound of voices from inside the room, and shuffling footsteps, before the door opens. The boy standing in front of him is so tall Sylvain has to look up to meet his eyes. His features are clearly of Duscur.

“You may enter,” the Duscur boy says with a very smooth voice. Sylvain’s head is almost spinning as he tries to figure out if this boy is older or younger than he is, and why exactly he’s hanging around the prince all of a sudden.

Gilbert and the boy exchange a nod as Gilbert leaves down the hallway and Sylvain unceremoniously takes a step into the crown prince’s room. Almost nothing has been touched since the last time he’d been in here. The curtains are open just a bit, and the midday sun shines brightly through the arched windows. 

“Hey,” Sylvain mutters a little too softly, as soon as he notices the blonde boy in his too-large bed. 

Dimitri had been staring out the window. He turns his head back a little with a “hmm?” before he takes in the sight of his reckless redhead friend a few steps into his room. His once bright eyes are unmistakably tired, but they seem a little softer at the sight of Sylvain.

“You’re here,” he says, almost smiling (but not quite, Sylvain notes.) “Um, you can sit over here,” the prince offers, gesturing a bit towards the armchair positioned next to his bed. Sylvain sits down, his eyes wandering towards the Duscur boy on the other side of the bedroom, but he doesn’t say a thing. Dimitri shuffles a bit, sitting up more and maneuvering so he’s closer to the edge of his bed and to Sylvain. 

Sylvain’s head is swimming with things he wants to say, things he needs to admit, and things he doesn’t think Dimitri needs to think about right now. He settles to say “I made it.”

“I’m... really happy,” Dimitri admits, not really looking at Sylvain. His crisp blue pajamas look a little big for him, only serving to make him look smaller, weaker, even if Sylvain thinks that right now he’s the strongest person he’s ever met. “Gilbert says I can’t leave yet, so I like having visitors,” he continues.

Sylvain takes this opportunity. “That boy— over there, is he visiting you too?” 

“Dedue?”

“Yeah, him.”

Dimitri shakes his head a bit. “He’s always here, now. I like his company.”

Dedue nods from across the room. “His Highness has been very kind to me, and I would like to repay my debt to him.” Sylvain sees Dimitri shrink into his pajamas a little, but he can’t tell what the boy is thinking. 

“Damn. I can see why you two are friends,” he says, trying to lighten the mood a little. “His Highness is always so serious like that.”

Dimitri sighs, and Sylvain notices him wincing a little when he shifts in his bed. “Hey, you okay?” he asks, trying not to seem too motherly in his concern for his younger friend.

“I’m alright,” Dimitri assures. Sylvain had heard that he hadn’t escaped the massacre unscathed, and although his overly large pajamas obscured any visible scarring (except for a fading bruise near his temple,) Sylvain knew that the prince was likely injured and hurting quite a bit. “I feel better than most days.”

“Just don’t— don’t move too much, you know?”

“You sound like Dedue,” the blonde boy groans.

“Hey, now, I’m just trying to make sure you get better so we can hang out again sometime.”

(They both know there will be no “hanging out” again. Whatever they had in the past is in pieces now, and both young men are fully aware of this. For this one moment, however, they come to a mutual agreement to simply pretend.)

“Honestly. I think it would be possible for me to ‘hang out’ with you in the gardens even today, but Gilbert insists that I stay confined here,” the prince says with a hint of impatience. “He treats me as if I am helpless.”

“You cannot walk, Your Highness,” Dedue suddenly points out from his spot on the other side of the room, the soft sternness of his voice almost making Sylvain jump. 

All of a sudden, it seems like the two don’t even notice that Sylvain is still sitting in his armchair. Dimitri turns his head to the Duscur boy. “I haven’t tried,” he says matter-of-factly. “Gilbert only says I cannot walk, but I haven’t been allowed to try for myself just yet.”

“You are still recovering.”

“I’ll only get weaker, confined to bed!”

“You still need time to heal, Your Highness.”

Now that he’s more riled up, Dimitri attempts to move his body around to face Dedue. The movement is a little too fast, a little too jarring on his body, though, and he lets out a cry of pain, flopping back down onto his pillow. 

“Dimitri, you idiot,” Sylvain sighs, and he mentally chides himself for calling His Highness by his first name. He hopes Dedue doesn’t think he’s being horrifically offensive. “There’s a reason everybody’s making you rest. We care about you, so don’t you dare start getting yourself hurt.”

Dimitri doesn’t bother trying to sit up any more again, only turns his head towards Sylvain and closes his eyes. “I just don’t want to be here any longer,” he mutters, softly, fingers clasped tightly around the ends of his sleeves. 

Sylvain nods solemnly, though he knows little else other than the fact that he has been confined to bed rest since the Tragedy. In reality, the prince has only been conscious for a little over a week at the most. The first week was characterized by brief moments of lucidity in between large stretches of drugged sleep. He’d been sedated for hours and hours as healers tried to survey his body for the full extent of damage it had sustained. They hadn’t sedated him to keep him comfortable and pain-free, mostly; it was for the safety of the healers who were terrified of being on the receiving end of a frenzied swing from the unnaturally strong prince.

They’d stopped drugging him a while ago, and Dimitri’s days had become longer and filled with nothing but overthinking and anxiety. His only anchor during long days spent with nothing but the occasional healer visit and the light of the windows was Dedue. It was during one particularly uncomfortably uneventful day that Sylvain had gotten the notice that Dimitri would appreciate a visit from him. The note hadn’t been written by Dimitri himself, as it was in blockier, messier letters than the prince’s overly fancy, looped script. Nonetheless, Sylvain took the idea to heart, and here he was now, sitting by his friend’s bedside. 

“You’ve always been freakishly strong. I’m sure you’ll be up and out of here before you know it.”

“I truly hope.” 

There’s a long, yet not awkward silence after Dimitri speaks. Sylvain’s fingers tap an odd rhythm against the side of the armchair, and that is essentially the only sound in the room save for breathing. Not one of the three young men is looking at another, as all are lost deep in thought.

“I’ll try to bring Ingrid along next time,” Sylvain finally states, and he looks over at the boy still looking too small in his bed. “Dimitri?”

He’s spacing out quite intensely right now, but Sylvain doesn’t want to poke him or anything for fear of aggravating one of his many injuries. Fortunately, Dimitri seems to hear him, albeit a little late. “Hm? Oh! I’m sorry, Sylvain, what did you say?”

“I’ll bring Ingrid along next time.”

Dimitri nods a little. “I’d—like to see her.” 

“Me too,” Sylvain almost says. Instead,  
“I hope there won’t be a next time I have to visit you in bed, but... if I do, it won’t be just me coming through the door.”

“It will be you, and a girl,” Dimitri says, nodding. He’s clearly spacing out a little more, and Sylvain doesn’t think he’ll be mentally with them for too much longer. Still, he has to stifle a chuckle at what Dimitri’s mind instantly goes to when he thinks of him.

“Maybe two,” Sylvain adds with a shrug, and Dimitri merely nods again. Sylvain contemplates ruffling his hair, but he remembers the fading bruise from earlier and stops himself. 

“Maybe two,” Dimitri echoes. Dedue is starting to walk over to Sylvain, and Sylvain knows it’s probably best for him to leave now. He’s a little jealous that this odd Duscur boy is trusted to stay by Dimitri’s side all the time rather than him, one of his childhood friends, but he doesn’t give a voice to this jealousy. 

“I could show you to your room, now,” Dedue offers.

“It’s fine, but thanks,” Sylvain says, hoisting himself out of his armchair. “I know the guest rooms here inside and out.” With a small glance at the prince, who is truly lost in his own mind now, Sylvain steps out of the doorway and shuts the door behind him.

——

“It’s Stepmother, this time,” Dimitri says after a while to Dedue, after Sylvain has left. His hallucinations are no longer alarming to the older boy; he’s merely relieved that this one is not one of the painful ones that leaves Dimitri crying and clawing bloody lines into his already scarred arms.

“Sylvain will help me, Stepmother,” Dimitri nods into the air rather enthusiastically. “He is my friend, and he will help me avenge you, too. My friends are here for me now, and they will help me.” He looks to the void for approval, and it seems he has gained it, for when Dedue next glances over at the prince, a faint smile is on his resting face.


End file.
